Name Designation Affiliation Date Signature

Submittedby:

RPMillenaar ChiefSiteEngineer

SPDO 16/11/11

Acceptedby:

RTSchilizzi Director SPDO 16/11/11

Approvedby:

RTSchilizzi Director SPDO 16/11/11

RFIIMPACTATCANDIDATESKAREMOTESTATIONSITESAUSTRALIAEDITION

Documentnumber ................................................................. WP3‐050.020.010‐TR‐005Revision ....................................................................................................................... A2Author........................................................................................................ R.P.MillenaarDate ............................................................................................................... 16‐11‐2011Status ....................................................................................................FinalConfidential

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DOCUMENTHISTORY

Revision DateOfIssue EngineeringChange

Number

Comments

‐ 14‐11‐2011 ‐ Firstdraft

A 16‐11‐2011 ‐ Final

A1 23‐11‐2011 ‐ InformationforSouthernAfricaonly,nofurherchanges

A2 23‐11‐2011 ‐ InformationforAustraliaonly,nofurherchanges

DOCUMENTSOFTWARE Package Version Filename

Wordprocessor MsWord Word2007 RFIImpactatcandidateremotestationsites‐AUS1.0.docx

Blockdiagrams

Other

ORGANISATIONDETAILSName SKAProgramDevelopmentOffice

Physical/PostalAddress

JodrellBankCentreforAstrophysics

AlanTuringBuilding

TheUniversityofManchester

OxfordRoad

Manchester,UK

M139PLFax. +44(0)1612754049

Website www.skatelescope.org

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TABLEOFCONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................. 6

2 SCOPE ........................................................................................................ 6

3 METHOD .................................................................................................... 6

4 REMOTESTATIONCONFIGURATION ................................................................... 74.1 Site‐specificconfigurationAustralasia ..................................................................................... 7

5 INFORMATIONSUPPLIED ................................................................................. 95.1 Australasia................................................................................................................................ 9

6 RESULTS ................................................................................................... 106.1 Australasia.............................................................................................................................. 11

7 REFERENCES............................................................................................... 36

FIGURESFigure 1: Locations of 25 remote stations (red) in the Australian configuration. The inner 180km

spirals inblue.Thewhitegrid is5degreesonaside,correspondingtoa fixedN‐S lengthof560km and an E‐W dimension (which varies with latitude) of 510km along the Tropic ofCapricorn(Yellowline). ............................................................................................................... 8

Figure2:AUSTRALIA,Site1 ................................................................................................................. 11Figure3:AUSTRALIA,Site2 ................................................................................................................. 12Figure4:AUSTRALIA,Site3 ................................................................................................................. 13Figure5:AUSTRALIA,Site4 ................................................................................................................. 14Figure6:AUSTRALIA,Site5 ................................................................................................................. 15Figure7:AUSTRALIA,Site6 ................................................................................................................. 16Figure8:AUSTRALIA,Site7 ................................................................................................................. 17Figure9:AUSTRALIA,Site8 ................................................................................................................. 18Figure10:AUSTRALIA,Site9 ............................................................................................................... 19Figure11:AUSTRALIA,Site10 ............................................................................................................. 20Figure12:AUSTRALIA,Site11 ............................................................................................................. 21Figure13:AUSTRALIA,Site12 ............................................................................................................. 22Figure14:AUSTRALIA,Site13 ............................................................................................................. 23Figure15:AUSTRALIA,Site14 ............................................................................................................. 24Figure16:AUSTRALIA,Site15 ............................................................................................................. 25Figure17:AUSTRALIA,Site16 ............................................................................................................. 26Figure18:AUSTRALIA,Site17 ............................................................................................................. 27Figure19:AUSTRALIA,Site18 ............................................................................................................. 28Figure20:AUSTRALIA,Site19 ............................................................................................................. 29Figure21:AUSTRALIA,Site20 ............................................................................................................. 30Figure22:AUSTRALIA,Site21 ............................................................................................................. 31Figure23:AUSTRALIA,Site22 ............................................................................................................. 32Figure24:AUSTRALIA,Site23 ............................................................................................................. 33

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Figure25:AUSTRALIA,Site24 ............................................................................................................. 34Figure26:AUSTRALIA,Site25 ............................................................................................................. 35

TABLESTable1:ThelocationsoftheAustralasianremotestations .................................................................. 7

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Glossary

EMI ElectroMagneticInterferenceITU InternationalTelecommunicationsUnionFoM FigureofMeritPFD PowerFluxDensity(indBWm‐2Hz‐1)PSD PowerSpectralDensity(indBWHz‐1)RAS RadioAstronomyServiceRFI RadioFrequencyInterferenceRQZ RadioQuietZoneSKA SquareKilometreArraySPDO SKAProgramDevelopmentOffice

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1 Introduction

Atanearlystageinthedevelopmentofsite‐specificconfigurationsfortheSKA,theresultofwhichhasbeendescribed in [1], itwasagreedamongst thetwositeproponentsandSPDOtodevelopaFigureofMerit(FoM)forspectrumcrowdingatremotestationlocations.Ofthesethereare25andallofthemaresituatedoutsidetheRadioQuietZone(RQZ)thatwillbeimplementedatthecentrallocation,and thereforedonotbenefit fromoptimal radio interferenceconditions.The locationofeach remote station is a compromise in radio quietness (away from human presence), andaccessibility intermsofroads, fibrehook‐upandpowerdelivery (closetohumanpresence),whilealsooptimisingforscienceimagingquality.Inaprocessstartingfromgenericspecificationstofinallocations the SPDO has worked with the site proponents to design the course locations of theremote stations. Final adjustments of these locations were done by the proponents on theirconfiguration to find thebestcompromise.Partof thisprocesswasadesktopanalysis,evaluatingtheimpactoflicensedradiotransmittersaroundeachofthetargetstationsbycalculatingthepowerspectraldensity(PSD)ofreceivedsignalsatthatlocationoriginatingfromtransmittersinthatarea.The informationgained in thesecalculations ispresented in this report.Thepurpose is toprovideevaluatorsanddesignengineersanoverviewofexpectedRFIimpactattheremotestations.Thiswork is tobecomplementedbyasurveyof theradio interferenceenvironmentatall remotestationsoncesiteselectionhasbeendone.Already,aspartoftheinvestigationsinthesiteselectionprocess, four of these remote site locations for each candidate host have been visited by a localteamtoperformmeasurements,usingtheequipmentdevelopedbytheSPDOandsiteproponentsfortheRFImeasurementcampaignin2010/11.Theresultsfortheseremotesitesarereportedin[2]and[3],inananonymousfashion.Thisreportconnectsthesemeasurementswiththeresultsofthedesktopanalysisforthesefourcaseseach.

2 Scope

ThisdocumentreportsonthespectrumcrowdingFoMresultsintheformofplotsofreceivedsignallevelsateachofthe25proposedremotestationlocations.Thisreporthastwoeditions:

• Fullreport(thisreportedition,RevisionA)• SpecificreportforSouthAfrica(RevisionA1)• SpecificreportforAustralia(RevisionA2)• Anonymous version (Revision B), where all references to country/countries and specific

locations have been removed. It uses X and Y to distinguish between proponents andsequencenumbersforremotestations.

3 Method

ThefollowingmethodwasdiscussedandagreedamongstSPDOandsiteproponents:Foreachofthe25remotestationlocations,

• collect information on transmitters in databases selected to provide a complete andaccurate overview of transmitter frequencies, EIRP, bandwidth, antenna height andradiationpattern,distance,

• collectinformationoninterveningterrainfromtransmittertoremotestation,• calculatepropagationattenuation,usingtheterrain informationandantennadistanceand

heightintheITU‐RP.526‐11model,• findreceivedPSD levelsat theremotestation,byapplyingthepropagationattenuationto

theemittedlevelinthedirectionofthestation.

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Theagreedrangeoftransmitterstobeconsideredwasupto150kmfromthelocationoftheremotestation.

4 RemoteStationConfiguration

4.1 Site‐specificconfigurationAustralasia

TheremotestationlocationsintheAustralasianarrayaregiveninTable1.

SiteRFImeas.sitenr. Elevation Country Longitude Latitude

01 n/a AUS 115.9250 ‐28.375002 n/a AUS 117.8000 ‐28.200003 n/a AUS 119.0000 ‐26.505004 n/a AUS 117.7600 ‐28.838405 n/a AUS 119.4000 ‐25.590006 n/a AUS 119.9300 ‐26.611907 n/a AUS 116.9650 ‐29.870008 n/a AUS 120.7670 ‐28.150009 n/a AUS 119.8450 ‐23.895010 n/a AUS 121.2094 ‐29.226011 Y1 n/a AUS 120.4000 ‐31.090012 n/a AUS 122.6000 ‐28.595013 n/a AUS 122.4800 ‐30.845014 n/a AUS 121.3000 ‐33.130015 n/a AUS 123.9000 ‐32.400016 Y2 n/a AUS 125.5900 ‐30.650017 n/a AUS 128.8900 ‐26.130018 n/a AUS 126.5250 ‐18.735019 n/a AUS 130.5000 ‐31.500020 n/a AUS 133.2900 ‐25.150021 Y3 n/a AUS 133.8015 ‐31.906022 n/a AUS 134.3830 ‐19.691723 Y4 n/a AUS 140.9650 ‐32.250024 n/a AUS 143.1670 ‐22.600025 n/a AUS 146.2167 ‐26.1500

Table1:ThelocationsoftheAustralasianremotestationsTheremotestationlocationsareplottedonthemapinFigure1,togetherwiththelocationoftheelementsintheinnerareaof180kmradius.

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Figure1: Locationsof25 remotestations (red) in theAustralianconfiguration.The inner180kmspirals inblue. The white grid is 5 degrees on a side, corresponding to a fixed N‐S length of 560km and an E‐Wdimension(whichvarieswithlatitude)of510kmalongtheTropicofCapricorn(Yellowline).

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5 Informationsupplied

The site proponents have carried out the collection of transmitter details and have done thecalculations for received PSD levels. The information was supplied to the SPDO in either of twoforms,describedinthefollowingsections.

5.1 Australasia

A document [5] was supplied, which describes the work done, the information used and theresultingplotsofreceivedPSDlevels.Thefollowingdetailshavebeenprovidedin[5]:“TransmitterdatabaseThe source for the transmitter information is the Register of Radio communications Licensesmaintained by theAustralian Communications andMedia Authority (ACMA), and issuedmonthly.ThisanalysisusestheFebruary2011data.Itmustbenotedthat:a)Thepowerlevelinthedatabaseisthemaximumallowedbytheservice,notnecessarilytheactualpowertransmitted.b) Some of the licensed services may not be in operation any longer; others may only transmitintermittently.c) Fordirectional transmitters, anantennagain,3dBbeamwidth, front‐to‐back ratioandazimuthdirectionareprovided,sothesidelobelevelinthedirectionoftheproposedsiteisestimatedfromthesevalues.Forthesereasons,thelevelsintheplotsarebasedonaworst‐casetransmittedpowerlevelandmayoverestimatethespectralcrowdingatthesite.”

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6 Results

Theresultsarepresentedintwoseriesof25plots,eachwiththreesubpanels,fromthetop:1.ReceivedPSDlevelsindBW/Hzforthefrequencyrangeof300to25000MHz.Thelowerboundaryissetto300MHzbecausethisisthelowestforeseeablefrequencyinuseattheremotestations(dishonly).ThiswastheagreedlowerfrequencyforthisFoManalysis.Itmustbenotedinfactthatintheplots provided by Australia the lower boundary appears to be at 400MHz. The informationprovided by South Africa included much lower frequencies (<100MHz) but the plots that wereproducedbySPDOandpresentedhere,duplicatethefrequencyscale.Evaluatorsshouldthereforedisregardsignalsbelow400MHzwhenmakingcomparisons.Thesubpanelalsodisplays,inred,thethresholdPSDlevel(ΔPindBW/Hz)specifiedbyITU‐RRA.769‐2forVLBI,see[4],alsoreferredtoas‘Recommendation769’.InthisreferencethethresholdinterferencelevelsforVLBIobservationsaregivenasspectralpfd levels (SH indBWm‐2Hz‐1) inTable3.Toconvertthese levelstothesamePSDunitsasusedforthereceivedlevelsthefollowingexpressionisused(asperexpression5in[4]):

ΔP769VLBI = SH − 20 log( f ) −10 log( c2

4π) = SH − 20 log( f ) −158.5(dBWHz−1) ,

wherefistheobservingfrequencyinRec.769Table3.Thisequationfollowsfromtherelationshipofantennagainandeffectivearea,wherethegainissetto0dBi,asspecifiedinRec.769.Itisusefultoplotthisthresholdleveltoassessthereceivedinterferencefromlicensedtransmitters,but it should be noted that Rec. 769 sets protection levels for the bands reserved for the ‘RadioAstronomy Service’ (RAS) only. Here a plot with linearly interpolated levels between specifiedobservingfrequenciesisused.ReceivedlevelshigherthantheRec.769levelsaretobeexpectedforfrequenciesoutsidetheprotectedbands,asisdemonstratedintheseplots.2.ReceivedPSDlevelsindBabovetheRA.769‐2thresholdlevelforVLBIunder1,versusdistanceinkm.3.ReceivedPSDlevelsindBabovetheRA.769‐2thresholdlevelforVLBIasdescribedunder1,versusbearingindegrees,where0°isNorth.

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6.1 Australasia

Plotsreproducedfrom[5].

Figure2:AUSTRALIA,Site1

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Figure3:AUSTRALIA,Site2

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Figure4:AUSTRALIA,Site3

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Figure5:AUSTRALIA,Site4

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Figure6:AUSTRALIA,Site5

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Figure7:AUSTRALIA,Site6

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Figure8:AUSTRALIA,Site7

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Figure9:AUSTRALIA,Site8

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Figure10:AUSTRALIA,Site9

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Figure11:AUSTRALIA,Site10

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Figure12:AUSTRALIA,Site11

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Figure13:AUSTRALIA,Site12

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Figure14:AUSTRALIA,Site13

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Figure15:AUSTRALIA,Site14

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Figure16:AUSTRALIA,Site15

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Figure17:AUSTRALIA,Site16

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Figure18:AUSTRALIA,Site17

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Figure19:AUSTRALIA,Site18

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Figure20:AUSTRALIA,Site19

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Figure21:AUSTRALIA,Site20

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Figure22:AUSTRALIA,Site21

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Figure23:AUSTRALIA,Site22

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Figure24:AUSTRALIA,Site23

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Figure25:AUSTRALIA,Site24

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Figure26:AUSTRALIA,Site25

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7 References

[1] ArrayConfigurationsforCandidateSKASites:DesignandAnalysis,R.P.Millenaar,R.C.Bolton,J.

Lazio,Rev.C,SPDO,4‐11‐2011[2] SKA Site SpectrumMonitoring Sites: X1‐X4 and Y1‐Y4,MeasurementMode:MaxHoldMode

(MH),Rev.1.0,A.J.Boonstra,R.P.Millenaar,30‐9‐2011[3] SKASiteSpectrumMonitoringSites:X1‐X4andY1‐Y4,MeasurementMode:RuralMode(RM),

Rev.1.0,A.J.Boonstra,R.P.Millenaar,28‐9‐2011[4] Protectioncriteriausedforradioastronomicalmeasurements,RecommendationITU‐RRA.769‐

2,2003[5] Australian Remote Sites – Power Spectral Density estimation to assess spectral crowding, C.

Wilson,CSIRO,3‐06‐2011